Well, I'm home from Korea. South Korea.

Some things I learned: the US FTA with Korea is totally unfair. We allow them to export their cars, technology, phones, etc. but in return, THEY have to take our agricultural exports. And they are a very agri-friendly country, so they grow plenty of stuff on their own! The farmers were practically rioting outside the capitol one day, because they can't sell their stuff, and they have to sell it for a LOT more than the US imported stuff. So, when you are in SKorea, you are eating California grown rice, midwestern soy products, beef and dairy from the beef and dairy states, and the only stuff they actually grow in S Korea and sell to Koreans is sweet potato and cabbage. That's it, pretty much. There is also a thriving organic sector in South Korea. But I think the trade agreement we have with South Korea is for shite. A Ford, with all of the tarrifs attached to it thanks to all the tarrifs we place on them, costs as much as a Jaguar. They do that to keep Fords out, because a) American cars are crap and b) we pull that shit on them as well.

There are 3 generations of Koreans. The ones who fought in the war, the ones who were raised during the "cold war", and the ones who started school in the 1980s. The fighters are very conscious of the fact that they have "family" and blood ties in North Korea; they want reunification. The cold war/baby boomer generation (40-60 year olds) do not trust the North, but think food should be sent, and that's about it. They would reunify if the North accepted everything the South believes in. The weirdest generation is the youngest. The 8-39 year olds. They believe that the north is a stagnant culture, steeped in harmless communist rhetoric, that they are poor harmless people and they feel sorry for them, but could care less if the people in the North are ever reunified. They feel no ties to them. They also feel incredibly safe; the other two generations? Not so much. It was kind of a surprise.

I'm more of the 3rd generation, I don't think of North Korea as much of a threat. But I am dead wrong. They are a seriously messed up country. The people ARE starved and poor, but the ones who get fed are in the military, and the children are totally brainwashed. Also, they are under pain of death if they try to explore the southern coast or try to escape. It's bad. The regime is horrid.

The rest of my trip went well. I missed my beanie and my PF desperately. I would love to go back to Asia with them, maybe take a hopper to Hong Kong or Shanghai. The roads to China from Korea are pretty open nowadays. I think getting a Visa is pretty tough going, though.

Next week I need to go to the Brazillian consulate for my Visa. I'm FINALLY going to Curitiba. This is after mythologizing the city for a good 10+ years after learning about Jaime Lerner and the mecca of Urban Planning.

It's another week away from my bean, but I need to do it for work. She will understand eventually. Someday I may even take her with me on a business trip. How fun would that be, my darling beanie boo? You could play in the sands of Rio De Janeiro or Jeju Island.

Now I have that Salinger poem in my head:

Dance Along The Silv'ry Sands
and Beat The Turtle Drum...
That Youth May Last Forever,
and Sorrow Ne'er Come.

I have quite a few pics of my trip. I will upload them this weekend when I get a chance.

So glad to be home....

~The Beanie Mommy

Oh my beanie buddha.

I love you.

Haiku Beanie

Sneaky little baby girl,
You wake up at five.
that's killing me every time...

She wakes up. Silently. And if she doesn't slide off the bed to pad through the house, she is pulling up my shirt squeaking "eh eh eh" until I wake up enough to give over my nunu or she figures it out herself and latches on. Once, through my PJs. Weird wet spot in the morning. She wanders in the darkness and doesn't cry out. Sometimes Daddy finds her and plugs her with a bottle. Is she hungry? Is she having growth spurt pains? It's pretty regular, like night hormones are. My theory is a jolt of growth hormone.

Tried to buy a slide at Toys R Us. Had the roughest time. All I want: a toddler slide for indoors that folds in half and can be stored in a freaking closet. Something she can climb, but not too high that if she wipes out it's a trip to the ER. Man. What the hell is wrong with Toys R Us? They are lame as lame can be. I got the most ridiculously bad customer service, I can't begin to describe it. I am going to try to find it at Target today.

And I just want a slide so that I can guarantee exercise for the kid, especially when it's too wet outside to go for walks. Part of me says "we oughtta start trying for another one in March" and the other part of me says "Why hurry? we have enough on our plate..." A baby right now? Would put me in an insane asylum. But I miss being prego. I miss my round little belly with the little pops and starts, punches and hiccups happening in secret. I don't miss the hip pain or the pubic shear or the sleepless nights when it was too hot for me to even sweat, but I miss everything up to that point. Sigh. Another little baby butt to pinch and pat, a tum to kiss on, a neck to snuggle... So, maybe we will try again? Beans is still pretty cute...we could wait awhile.

I go to Korea for 2 weeks again on Sunday. Part of me? Looking forward to it for various reasons. Like the one that says "if you go to sleep, you can stay asleep." Except that I woke up at 5 AM expecting to nurse a kid last time I was there. Every morning. Another reason says "2 weeks? WEANIE BEANIE!" Wean that little sucker. By force. Another reason? I will earn 4 days off by giving up some weekend action. And it's not like it's hard to be in Korea: last time, I walked all over, ate lightly and lost 3 lbs that I managed to keep off. So far total weight loss since July trip: 5 lbs and counting. It's very hard.

But it will be another 6 lbs off if I play it right.

So, there are tons of reasons to go.

And of course, the best reasons in the world not to go: PF and Beanie boo.

However, I know that she's in good hands and that he will survive without me. It's me who will be hurting for them...

But I'll drown my sorrows in sightseeing and good cognac and Bibimbap.

After my Korea trip, I head to the Brazilian consulate for a visa. I will be heading an orientation trip down there, and doing presentations.

Another week away from my beanie. I would actually love to take her with me. And the PF. I'd drag him too. I'd figure out a long-term stay with a trusted friend for Seamas and the "cTats!" and loan out my frogs to a preschool or something.

I am trying to score a year abroad for me and my familia. Won't happen for awhile, but wouldn't that be awesome? We could all live for cheap in Brazil. Serious cheap. And it wouldn't be awkward, like it might be in Uber Whitey Eastern Europe, the other countries we work with are quite racially homogenous. I'd be fine. PF? Would get killed in Eastern Europe. I keep having scary dreams of him being snapped in half by a freakishly large, stupid, drunken Ukrainian. So, we will avoid. But Brazil?

It's quite common to find kids named Joao-Carlos Fukukawa Chong Bastille Marone Moreira. And he might be dating a kid named Mitsuo "Mitzie" Smith Shigekaga Perreira Haagen Beck. You just never know. They have the longest names in the world, those Brazilian kids. Beanie, whose name is Elspeth Lorelei, would be an outlier merely from the fact that her name is so short.

I would probably be very happy in Brazil. For awhile.

Beans, I will be home before Halloween. I promise you, my little Treat.

Beanie killed us last night. She's been passing out around 9 PM, which is nice. I take her to bed with me. We sleep great. Until 1 or 2 AM when she wakes up and tries to do her rounds in the room or find her toys. Or she pounds and kicks on me or her dad until we wake up.

Last night I was so beat from only a few hours the night before and a bad backache, I begged her dad to take her into the living room. At some point he came back with her and thought she would sleep. No cigar. She was awake. I kicked them both out again. He's so exhausted. He can barely talk. I feel bad for him, but I need to get up early and go. It takes me fully 20 minutes in heavy traffic until I get to my secret commute street. Today I nearly crashed because I'm freakin' tired!!

Part of me thinks she needs a crib, but then how much sleep would I get if she screams from the other room? Not to mention, we live in apartments. My neighbors would be none too thrilled if that happened at 2 AM. I'm happy to continue sharing our bed until she's 6, but she has to SLEEP. She is NOT conforming to the Attachment Parenting/Cosleeping/No Schedule program. And it's kicking my ass right now. I need encouragement that it will "pass" soon, or that she's just in need of a "drink" in the wee hours...

Around 2:47 AM, she started calling out for "Juice". I woke him up brusquely, and Dad got it and I fell back to sleep. When I woke up around 6:30 AM, she was hot in her fleece sleeper. I unzipped it. By 7 AM when I got up, I knew she had a fever. When she actually woke up around 7:30 AM, I gave her some tylenol and got her a bottle of milk. By the time I headed for work, her fever had broken and she was sucking her bottle like she'd been sleeping in a desert.

I also looked up "getting toddlers to sleep" online. Most of those folks with good advice are not co-sleepers; they are talking about cribbed kids, so it doesn't apply right now. Most of the moms who are cosleepers don't work right now, so they are able to stay home with their late morning sleepy toddlers and can afford to stay up incredibly late. They talked about weaning. I have weaned her pretty much, except for her night night nunu and her early morning "nunu rape". She jumps me in her sleep when I'm sleeping and I often wake up with my shirt around my neck with her snugged up next to me. Actually, it could be me turning toward her in my sleep, but whatever. Weaning is probably not going to happen until she gets her own bed. But if she wakes up screaming, what do we do? I need my rest. I have TRIED to get her up early and to bed at a late enough time on the weekends, with enough napping to keep her fortified during my busy days with her. She's always pretty easygoing. It's the weekdays that suck ass.

We've always had a pretty good night sleeper. She has always been a light napper and a heavy sleeper, even as a tiny baby, minus some semi-colicky nights. She's always slept with us and until about 1 year old, didn't wake in the middle of the night more than just for a sleepy extra night nursing.

I'm going to keep a sippy cup full of water by the bed for her if she wakes up again. I will post if that helps us at all, because this has got to end.

I've never been a cranky sleeper, but I'm running full days of work/home life on about 4-5 hours, if that, a night. It's got me seriously moody. On top of that, I think my back is PMSing. Good for my hormones, bad for PF, who probably takes the brunt of my sleepy PMS aggravation. He's a good man. But my demand still stands: if the kid gets up, so does the parent who stays home. Period. PMS or no PMS.

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I lost my entire post!

I had posted about how we are still getting over colds and I am sick of my snot. Beanie is also making an awful lot still, and she won't let you wipe it.

Moe told me this past weekend (before we all headed to Apple Hill for our first excursion there this year!!) about a friend who sucked snot out of her infant's nose and then spit it out. I viscerally felt ill just from imagining that. I'm part horrified, part fascinated. I keep shoving Beanie's snotty face at her dad saying "Suck her nose out, c'mon, do it!!!" but he ignores me. This is because Beanie will actually blow into a tissue.

It's still hard to get her nose area clean, though. Babies just don't care if they have a boogie wavering in the breeze. They don't care if streams of snot are heading to their top lip. Luckily, Beanie is not a taster, because I'd gag. But she really hates having her nosie wiped. We tend to REALLY get it done in the shower, or after a bath when she is sleeping and you can dig a little. I personally cannot stand breathing around embedded crud, so I am projecting that onto my little daughter and will clean it out as soon as I think she is deeply asleep. Forget nasal bulb aspirators, by the way. Those are no good once they hit 1 month and can writhe. Sometimes when she is awake, we wipe as mush as we can and then try to bulb it, but you only get one nostril and you have to WWF her down.

One of the funniest things she started doing, besides the face I posted above (that's been her "face" for about 3 months now), is stand in the middle of the room making that face and "blowing" snot bubbles and snot from her nose. She also likes to hold the tissue and wave it while she's rhythmically blowing snot. She will copy you if you are blowing your nose, so we routinely take advantage of modeling it for her.

Other funny and precious things she does:
~Grunt like she's pooping if you start grunting yourself. Sometimes this triggers and actual poo, so I think she will be relatively easy to potty train.
~Laughs if she farts and you notice.
~says half words, like train whistle, which comes out "Taiynnn...Whisss." Or "Shabazz the Cat" which comes out "Baz cTat" or "Seamas! Uh oh!" which comes out "Maish...Uh oh!"
~She sneakily feeds the dog and cats from her high chair. She will watch us to make sure we don't notice (but we always do) and drop food or lean over to them. They love her.
~She copies us when we do the "W" shrug and say "I don't knowwwww-owww".
~When you tell her "Beanie, go grab your FAVORITE book and I'll read it" she will stop whatever she is doing, toddle to her bookshelf, pick out a book, and then toddle back to throw "Goodnight Moon" or "Zany Zoo" or "Pat The Bunny" in your lap. If you just say "Grab a book" she might come back with a magazine or something. It's almost as if she knows what "favorite" means.
~She can find her eyes, ears, nose and point to them if you ask her to find them. I had no idea she could do this until last night.

I know it's all normal baby stuff. But it's so exciting! Part of me screams "you're a f*cking GENIUS!" and the other half knows I read about this in the Sear's Baby Book, so she's basically on track with her peers and nothing to get excited about. But it's soooo exciting!

You forget how fun it is to discover new things until a kid starts discovering stuff that is old hat.

I remember when she was tiny and precious and snuggly and I didn't want her to grow up. PF remembers this too. We just wanted her to stay a baby. We thought we'd be sooo sad when she started turning into a "kid".

But it's hilarious! I can't wait until she starts telling bad jokes and helping me make cookies and everything else that little kids do with you.

Every moment is so great. Almost never does she make me mad (unless she bites the tip off my nipple and then I'm just in pain and can't stand to be around her for a couple of minutes. And yeah, it hurts like hell) and usually she makes me laugh.

Last night I got down on all fours and chased her around the room playing peek a boo/catch me if you can. I have the rug burns on the knees to prove it. She couldn't stop laughing.